Sooner or later, someone is going to ask if we can actually trust China’s
economic stats.

Sure, GDP data have none of the whodunit appeal of some of the scandals currently rocking Beijing. But the figures are starting to look a bit suspicious.

With each quarterly bulletin comes more official evidence of an economy coming off the boil with the sort of choreographed precision last seen in the synchronised swimming at the Beijing Olympics. GDP growth fell to 8.1pc in the first three months of this year, down from 8.9pc in the fourth quarter of 2011, 9.1pc in Q3, 9.5pc in Q2 and 9.7pc in Q1. Who says China can’t do a soft landing if it puts its mind to it?

This time round the figures are slightly worse than the forecast 8.3pc growth. But, even if the world’s second biggest economy is now expanding at its slowest rate for three years, that must be better for the rest of us than boom to bust.

China is actually trying to manage several things at once. It wants a gentle slowdown – but not the type that endangers job creation, so preventing new entrants to its 800m-strong workforce and the social unrest that would entail. It’s also seeking to rebalance the economy towards consumption, while ensuring that the property market softens without the roof coming off.

Friday’s glut of official figures points to some success. Export growth slowed (hardly surprising given there just aren’t as many euros around these days for all those Chinese toys) and industrial output was up only 11.6pc versus 15.7pc a year earlier.

But there were plenty of signs of life, with earlier monetary easing allowing banks to ramp up lending in March to more than 1 trillion yuan (£100bn) versus 711bn yuan in February – and retail sales growth rebounding to 15.1pc. Neither is 8.1pc GDP growth to be sniffed at when fixed-asset investment slowed to 20.9pc from 24pc last year, reflecting lower housing and construction activity.

The GDP figures prompted calls from some for another round of monetary relaxation to make sure there really is no hard landing. But that looks unnecessary. Bank of America Merrill Lynch was quick to claim growth is now back on the agenda, declaring: “The worst is over. The first quarter will be the trough of this cycle.”

In any case, China is targeting 7.5pc growth this year. If it wants to surprise on the upside, the official stats are already going the right way.